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OlflTEHLiOO: 

THE CAMPAiaN AND BATTLE. 



BIiOCHE^ ^ HlEItlilllGTOIl ^ JlAPOItEOH. 



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By J. WATTS de PEYSTER, 

Brev. Ma j. -Gen. S. N. Y., A.M., LL.D., Litt. D. 

NEW YORK : 

t'HAS. PI. LUDWIG & CO.. PRINTERS. 10 & 12 READE STREET. 

1893. 



/ 



\ 



WATEELOO : 

THE CAMPAIGN AND BATTLE, 



BLUCHEE—WELLINGTO]^— NAPOLEON. 



TOUT B'lWE VOLEE: 



"That whole nations believe is no evidence of truth." 

Jacobus Dusch. 

"In Harren und Krieg:, "In wistful waiting and war, 

In Sturz und Sieg, In disaster and victory, 

Bewuszt und gross ! Self -knowing and great ! 

So risz er uns So tore he us loose (or free) 

Vom Feinde los." From the enemy." 

Goethe on Blucheb. 

" England thinks there is no character like Wellington, in his acts arising 
from loyalty and duty to his sovereign and country. In this he was remarkable, 
but he is matched fully by Belisarius." 

" Great conquerors are shameless. They are simply outlaws. A man more 
destitute of regard for decency, moral or physical, than Napoleon Bonaparte 
never lived. Peter the Great was the same, and Charles V. not much better. " 

James Shepherd Pike. 



BY 

'i'' ^ ANCHOE. ^ 

NEW YORK : 

CHAS. H. LUDWIG & CO., PRINTERS, 10 & 12 READE STREET. 

1893. 



T'i,,'3.'oo 

C.lb-cic, 








THE CAMPAIGN OF WATERLOO. 

"A VOL D'OISEAUr 



By BuEV.-MAJ.-aEN. J. WATTS de PEYSTER, S. N. Y., 1866. 



The false reputation of Napoleon, wliicli saved liim at 
the Berezina and at other places, still imposes npon the 
majority of the reading world. Napoleon returned from 
Elba in response to a treasonable invitation fomented by 
his emissaries and partisans, which permeated society, 
although the base was to be "found in the licentious de- 
votion'of the French legions " (Md. 5). The contemptuous 
feeling that expressed Itself in the slur that Louis_ XVIII. 
came back among the baggage of the conquering Allies ; that 
he was surrounded by a set who had learned nothing and had 
forgotten nothing, who were, as a rule, under the influence of 
priests, to govern a people brought up to despise religion 
and bow to military despotism ; deprived the restored mon- 
arch of a respect which might have availed much to counter- 
act the efforts in favor of^Bonaparte. Marshal Soult has 
been suspected of materially facilitating the progress of the 
usurper (Md. 25), and as Minister of War he had sufficient 
opportunities to do so if he chose. Throughout Europe 
his connivance has been generally believed. Soult eche- 
loned 50,000 men along the^Klione, in southeastern France, 
ostensibly against Murat in Italy, which were the very 
troops that Napoleon found ready to his hand, advancing 
towards Lyous and Paris. It is strange how individuals 
of scarcely any account in themselves ; in crises loom up in 
gigantic proportions as the representatives of factions and 
pa'rties. Labedoyere, who was afterwards justly shot for 
his treason, was the spark which kindled the conflagration 
quenched in the blood of Waterloo. Tliis Colonel Labe- 
doyere belonged to the very class which of all others was 
accounted as devoted to the royal family. His treason 
to heredity and environment astonished Napoleon, as 



X- - \ 

n \ 



manifested by Lis exclamation wlien Labedoyere threw 
down the traditional Bonrbon white flag, blazoned with 
flenrs de lys, to be trampled nnder the feet of ISTapolepn's 
horse, "AVhat! M. Labedoyere, a gentleman! I did not 
think myself so powerful ! " The regiment, of Mdiicli the 
flag was thus outraged and dishonored, followed the exam- 
ple of the colonel, and the other regiments its example 
(Md. 52). Thus the army brought back ISTapoleon, not 
the people — the peace-seeking producing classes. He was 
afraid of the people, and manifested that fear in a variety 
of ways. 

Writers as a rule sneer at the Koyal government for not 
being able to present more opposition to JS^apoleon on his 
march from Cannes to Paris. A French writer, who took 
an accurate vieM^ of this astonishing success, made a very 
pertinent remark — "It was much easier for the Allies not 
to have sent Bonaparte to Elba [but to a St. Helena 
where he could have done no more mischief], than it was 
for Louis XVIIL to prevent his progress from Elba to 
Paris." The most false magnanimity wasted the fruits 
of the most glorious success, as did the Union North, when, 
with a stupidity unexampled, it threw back the control 
of the country into the hands of the Rebel South and its 
abettors — the power they had lost and forfeited by their 
treason, unexampled in being without an excuse. 

Napoleon, on repossession of power, has been glorified 
for the rapidity with which he reorganized his armies. This, 
in some respects, is utter exaggeration, if not absolute false- 
hood. It cannot compare with the resurrection of Prussia 
in arms to oppose him in 1812-13, or 1815, or the forma- 
tion of the Union armies in the Fall of 1861, not to men- 
tion the Rebel armies which acted against the latter, con- 
sidering that in the United States everything had to be 
provided, nay, improvised, to convert masses of men into 
an army. No one seems to remember that France was 
swarming with experienced oiBcers and soldiers ; "running 
over " with military men, who, in the language of Dav- 
oust, "were accustomed to the trade of war," and "who, 
as they had no other trade, preferred [that] occupation to 
indigence." "When it is considered that Napoleon re- 
quired every man he could bring together to strike the 
blow in Belofium which he knew was to be decisive of the 



event in his favor, if he had any reasonable chance at all, 
it is nnacconntable to observe, not that he took with him 
so many, bnt so few, to meet Wellington and Blncher. He 
might have taken with him Rapp's 20,000 {Gardner^ 9, 
7iote) without any injury to his cause, because the Russians, 
Bavarians and Austrians, to whom Rapp presented a 
phantom of resistance, did not cross the Rhine in force until 
after Waterloo had decided the question at once and forever. 
Again, he left 20,000, including a portion of his very 
Guard, under Lamarque, in La Vendee, when 10,000, or 
even less, would have been all-sufficient for the time being, 
because terrorising Morand (Md., 177-8) held the Royal- 
ists in check, and Fouche, a double traitor, had the sense 
to see, and the duplicity to convince the leaders of the 
King's party, that premature activity was a mere waste of 
life, since the result entirely depended on the remote 
possibility — if any there was — of Napoleon's triumph in 
Belgium, 

It is an indisputable truth, in the prosecution of warlike 
enterprises, that Time is the element of inestimable value. 
"In war a few^ minutes more or less make or mar." On 
an occasion similar to Blucher's withdrawal from Ligny 
(Yaudemont's famous retreat before Villeroy, in 1695), 
"Time fled, and with it victory." The loss or waste of 
time in war is simply unpardonable, and yet JSraj)oleon, who 
knew this, and who more than once emphasized the fact ; 
who declared, "'Hesitations and half measures ruin every- 
thing in War;" and who had won his greatest triumphs 
by the utmost improvement of days and hours and min- 
utes, failed in Belgium from incomprehensible delays and 
waste of time — all chargeable to himself and himself alone 
— which would have been unpardonable in a tyro at the 
trade of war. Gen. Gerard "deplored the incomprehen- 
sible, the irremediable delays." 

In his aggressions against the Prussians and Anglo- 
Allies in Belgium there were four, or even, perhaps, five 
lines of operation which Napoleon might have followed. 
The allied forces were very much dispersed, extending dis- 
located over a sinuous front of 200 miles. Jomini and others 
are of opinion that he should have chosen the third or the 
one next to the most easterly, the fourth line, descended 
the Meuse, and plunged into the midst of Blucher's scat- 



6 

terecl forces, instead of attacking M^liere lie did, by Cliar- 
leroj, the point to which Blucher and Wellington would 
naturally or inevitably converge to j^rotect Brussels. To 
fall upon Blucher' s forces, sprawled out, would have been 
most judicious, because Wellington, from his nature, would 
not have come promptly to the assistance of Blucher 
towards Namur or Liege, any more than he did at Ligny ; 
no, he would not have hastened, in the M-ay that Blucher 
helped Wellington out of his scrape at Waterloo. The 
Napoleon of 1814 would have repeated in June, 1815, 
his master stroke of February of the preceding year, 
which even Clause witz, the ultra-Prussian, declares, if 
followed up, would have retrieved ISTapoleon's fortunes. 
If he had concentrated his forces in May on his right, 
fallen through the Ardennes like a thuiiderbolt into the 
midst of Blucher's dislocated corps and divisions, and de- 
feated them in detail, he could have destroyed the Prussian 
forces effectively before Wellington could have arrived to 
Blucher's relief (Ropes, 197, says: "Wellington wholly un- 
prepared to assist his ally " ). The roads in this direction 
were as good as those which he did follow, and were so 
much better than those upon which he moved to victory 
in February, 1814, that their superiority is incalculable, 
without taking into consideration that June has always 
been accounted, from the earliest ages, the best month for 
military operations, and February about the worst. In 
this offensive, from and with his right, he could have con- 
centrated sufficient troojDS with as much speed and facility 
as he did on the centre, and could have drawn without 
difficulty Papp's corps, or army, and every man iu that 
direction disposable for active service, to his assistance. 
The writer has examined the best maps of the time., and 
every authority which money or perseverance could pro- 
cure; also owned or controlled hundreds, and has had access 
to many more, and if he were an officer of the highest 
rank, who could attract the attention and win the confi- 
dence of the public, he could prove to them that his opinion 
is correct. On the same principle Grant should have 
turned Lee's left in May, 1864; Lee should have turned 
Meade's left in July, 1863, as Bragg's left was turned 
later, on Mission, or Missionary, Pidge in November, 1863. 



It is a moot-point whether or not the Allies were sur- 
prised by Napoleon. To say that they were (especially 
Wellington), so excites the bile of the admirers of the 
"Iron Duke" that he is a bold man who even insinuates 
that he was. The decision of the question* depends on the 
definition of surprise. It was an axiom with Frederic the 
Great that a general should always endeavor to catch his 
opponent unprepared, and deceived as to the quarter and 
manner in which the blow would fall — ^^ Tmmer dem 
Feind auf den Hosen gesessen.'''' 

If to be beforehand with an adversary and render him 
undecided what first move or moves to make is a surprise, 
then both Wellington and Blucher were to a certain extent 
surprised. As regards Blucher, it was not such a surprise 
as nearly ruined the Army of Silesia in February, ISM; but 
it was a surprise equal to that which enabled him to win 
the battle of the Katzbach and successfully to transfer his 
army across the Elbe, at Wartenburg, in 1813. The best 
proof that Wellington was caught napping is the one error 
admitted by all his best friends, his leaving 18,000 men — 
so sorely needed at Waterloo — at Hal, theoretically to 
defend his right and communications from a movement 
in that direction by Napoleon, who unquestionably de- 
ceived him, or Wellington deceived himself in that respect. 
Napoleon certainly blinded Wellington as to his intentions 
and prevented him from assisting Blucher at Ligny ; and, 
if Napoleon had not wasted the best halves of two days, 
Wellington must have been worsted at Waterloo, because 
Napoleon could have brought a vast superiority of force, 
men and material to, bear upon him before the Prussians., 
could have possibly got up sufficiently to divert the action 
of one-quarter of the French army. Hill, on the first day 
of Gettysburg, 1863, was certainly surprised at finding 
Buford and the First Corps before him, just as Napoleon 
was to run unexpectedly into the Allied Army at Lutzen 
in 1813; and Meade was surprised by Lee's flanking in 
the Fall of 1863, as was Lee in 1862 through McClellan's. 
discovery by accident, at Frederick, Md., the dispositions 
of the Kebel troops previous to Antietam. 

With an admiration of the sublime heroism of Welling- 
ton and the responding sublimity of courage exhibited by 
his troops at Waterloo, and the more than extraordinary 



human resolution, energy, zeal and courage displayed by 
Blucher and the Prussians, nevertheless, the man of 
soldierly instincts who has diligently studied the Annals 
of War and the Manoeuvres of Campaigns, must be blind 
to the lessons of both if he shirks from expressing the 
disinterested opinion — an opinion the harder to reach 
because it is co-ordinate with a conviction that Napoleon 
heaped blunder upon blunder — that the French Emperor 
did surprise Blucher to some extent and Wellington in a 
much greater degree. Both magnilicently redeemed, their 
allowing themselves to be caught napping ; whereas the 
brilliancy of Napoleon's beforehand ability was totally 
and immediately eclipsed by hesitations, half measures and 
(under similar circumstances) an unparalleled, prodigal 
squandering — no other word will suit, waste is not strong 
enough — of time. 

From neglect in the discharge of staff duty there were 
delays which Napoleon himself styled fimeste (fatal), in 
getting his army across the Sambre on the 15th June, 
and Ziethen, who was in his front with the Prussian First 
Corps, to retard him, was enabled to do so, as much through 
Napoleon's mistakes as by his own masterly conduct. 
Although the ablest critics unite in ahnost unqualified 
praise of Ziethen 's fighting in retreat, which cost Napoleon 
almost the whole of the 15th, the reading world are not 
aM^are that it was about the finest thing of the kind ever 
done. Buford's magnificent fighting, with his cavalry 
alone holding back Hill on the first day of Gettysburg, is 
a similar example of what can be accomplished in such a 
case by a courageous leader, who possesses the entire confi- 
dence of his men. 

[Cite authorities in praise of Ziethen: Hamley, Mitchell, 
Cust, Clausewitz, Gardner, 45, and others.] 

It was a question nearly a hundred years ago of what 
would have been the result if Suworrow and Napoleon 
had met when both were at their greatest, as experts in 
. thelatter's '"Military Arithmetic," or prodigal exjDendi- 
ture of human life, and the influence of both upon their 
respective armies was about equal, with the superiority 
in the latter respect rather inclining to the Russian. 
It was Suworrow's dictum (see his Maxims, or "Dis- 
course under the Trigger") to attack at once an 



9 

enemy not settled, or concentrated, in his position, with 
whatever troops are in hand, and feed the tight with 
fresh forces as fast as they come np, trusting to the effects 
of surprise uponM'ant of preparation. This rule Napoleon 
should have followed on the 15th p. m. and at Ligny, 16th 
A. M. If the French troops were in anything like the 
average condition imputed to them by their advocates, 
Napoleon should have continued to press Ziethen on the 
evening of the 15tli (Gardner, 45). The fact, however, 
is that Ziethen had performed his part so M^ell, and Kapo- 
leon had tilled his role so badly, that on that night the 
latter' s forces lay sprawled all over the Fleurus triangle — 
apex, Charleroi ; sides, 13 miles each, road to Quatre Bras, 
W., road to Sombreffe, E. ; base, 7^ miles — wherever the 
darkness had overtaken them. Next morning, 16tli, the 
Prussian Second and Third Corps were up. Nevertheless, 
Napoleon did not begin the battle till nearly 3 p. m. (2.30), 
the very minute at which Ney began his action at Quatre 
Bras. The sun rose about 4 a. m. (3.48). The day broke 
at least an hour earlier. At 8 a. m. Napoleon had only 
the remains of Ziethen's First Corps before him ; at 
11 A.M., Birch's Second Corps, scarcely in position ; at 12, 
Thielman's Tliird Corps. Therefore, Napoleon had actu- 
ally thrown away, as if they were valueless — when, on the 
contrary, they were priceless — at least nine hours of a very 
fine day. This is beyond question. There are other ques- 
tions which can never be decided. 1st. Did Blucher 
accept battle at Ligny on the unequivocal assurance that 
Wellington would assist him, which was not done (Char- 
ras, iv. I., 175)? 2d, "Was the eiFect of the unexpected 
appearance of D'Erlon's corps on the Brussian right-rear 
more prejudicial to Blucher or to Napoleon ? To impar- 
tial judgment it must seem most injurious to Blucher. 
3d, What was the final result of the day to Napoleon ? 
Undoubtedly he compelled the army of Blucher, in person 
terribly injured, to withdraw and abandon a large portion of 
the battlefield, but the Prussians remained in the presence of 
the French, holding part of their original positions until the 
next morning, and then withdrew unmolested, and where, 
and whither, and how they went no Frenchman knew. 
4th (Gardner, 121), Even next morning, when an English 
patrol advanced, driving in the French vedettes, it commu- 



10 

iiicatod witli tlie Prussians (Zietlien still at Brye [?] and 
Tliielinan at Sombreffe), and the Frencli were as quiet as 
lambs taking a morning nap, with no wolves or even 
sheep-eating dogs in the neighborhood. 5th, What were the 
relative losses of Napoleon and Blucher? By von Kaus- 
ler, best authority, the Prussian loss is given (p. 6QQ, &c.,) 
at 12,076, but this includes Ziethen's casualties of the 15th, 
making the loss at Ligny, proper, say 10,500. He adds, 
there are no indications or returns on which to base any cal- 
culations of the French loss. (Mitchell, III., 109, places the 
French losses 16 to 17,000.) Ko doubt a great many of 
the missing from Blucher' s ranks were recruits, disaffected 
or worse, from districts recently added to Prussia, who 
did disperse and run away, but they were no loss in fact. 
Like Hake's Cumberland Hussars at Waterloo, they would 
not fight, and were proof against shame, and such poison- 
ous reptiles are more dangerous to those near by than to 
those farther oif. Charras, a Frenchman who is very honest 
and friendly to his people, if justly antagonistic to Napo- 
leon, sets down the French loss at 11,450, although he 
elevates the Prussian loss to 18,000, which must include 
the runaways, some of whom never stopped until they 
reached the Rhine, demonstrating their utter worthless- 
ness. 

To the fight at Quatre Bi-as on the 16th, simultaneous 
with Ligny, a very few words will be, and need be, devoted 
herein. That the English had the best of it is indisput- 
able. Napoleon charges the failure ujion Ney. Could 
the slightest confidence be placed in the words of such an 
unblushing liar, there might be a doubt. That Ney was 
deprived ofD'Erlon's corps, and it was shuttle-cocked to 
and fro all day to no purpose, and that thus Ney was 
crippled, is chargeable to Napoleon himself. He, himself, 
was the hete noire of the whole campaign. 

When Napoleon's faculties, at the close of the day 
■ (16th) of the battle of Ligny, should have been most 
awake he went to sleep, and every one else under him 
seems to have followed his example. It was like Meade 
and his subordinates not following up, instantly and 
forcibly, the repulse of Pickett, which counter, Longstreet 
and other Rebel generals, recently (1893) admitted would 
have been fatal to Lee ; like Meade escorting Lee politely 



11 

out of Pennsylvania and Maryland, and leavino; him 
"severely alone" at Williamsport and Falling Waters, 
with a "swimming" river in flood in his rear, through 
which, to escape, some of the Kebel troops had to ford 
neck deep. Next morning, LTth, J^apoleon seemed in- 
crusted with "the mildew of apathy." The "Thunder- 
bolt of War," as he was so often styled, the energetic des- 
pot of 1813 and 1814, had become a sluggard and a babbler, 
and lost the better part of another day, 17th, even as he 
had allowed the Prussians, if he really dared to ^^ress them 
further the night before, to gain ten [12 ?] hours advance 
upon pursuit. Defiantly a portion of them stood at day- 
break in full sight of those of the French who were awake, 
and then orderly withdrew. It was not until noon that 
Grouchy — frightened, as Thiers* admits, at the responsi- 
bility thrust upon him — received his orders to move off 
and hold Blucher — hold the fearless, indefatigable Blu- 
cher, who snapped his fingers at him, glided off, not 
secretly, but often visible, on the road to Waterloo and 
the destruction of the French army there. It was three 
o'clock before the whole of Grouchy' s command were 
in motion, and about the same hour l^Tapoleon, who, his 
admirers assert, was itching to get hold of Wellington, 
went for him, the "Iron Duke," who had been quietly 
resting in front of 'Nej on the ground from which he had 
driven that marshal on the 16th. 

When Grouchy — Napoleon's scapegoat to the right — 
shrinking • from the burden imposed upon him, sought to 
elude that which he knew was beyond his strength, be- 
sought his master, "Send Ney, Sire" — Ney to be made 
the scapegoat on the left, as Grouchy was in the other 
direction, and on the morrow — "Send Ney and keep me 
with you;" he was dismissed, peremptorily, to the task 
assigned to him. 

When ISTapoleon did start he infused some energy into 
his troops, but as Thiers, his greatest panegyrist and 
apologist, admits, it took his army certainly three hours 
to get across the single bridge at G^nappe, M^hen there 
was another bridge accessible and fords close by. 

Dear reader, stop a moment and reflect ! Napoleon 
censured Wellington for fighting in front of the forest of 
Soignies, styling it a defile through which it was impossi- 



12 

ble for the Anglo- Allies, if defeated, to retreat with safety, 
whereas it was an open wood, without underbrush, trav- 
ersed by good roads, through which both artillery and 
cavalry could move M'ithout disorder or difficulty, and would 
have served as a cover and protection to such steady troops 
as the Anglo- Allies. This supercilious hypercritic forgot — 
notwithstanding the lesson impressed by the difficulty of 
crossing on the 17th — that he fought with a defile in Ai-s 
rear, which, the bridge of Genappe, served, wdthin another 
day, as a death-trap to his panic-stricken army, in which, 
also, all his material and most valuable effects were 
caught, to serve as trophies to the Blucher he affected to 
despise, and to the Prussians whom he boasted he had 
annihilated as an army at Ligny. 

At length, in the midst of a most severe rain storm, 
he found the English ready to receive him on the 
slopes of Mont St. Jean, as the French style the 
battle, and its field. When Kapoleon boasted that "he 
had them, those English ! " and that with "two more hours 
of daylight he would have made an end of them," the 
man was beside himself with self-dehision and boastfulness. 
He had over seven hours next day to make an end of 
those English before he tried it on, and although he 
bragged next morning that "the chances were ninety to 
ten in hie favor," he had not made an end of them when 
the Prussians smashed his right to pieces and jolayed with 
his flying troops like leopards and wolves with unprotected 
herds. Think how the loyal North w^as abused and ridi- 
culed for the panic (so styled and magnified) after Bull 
Run, 1st, in 1861 — where the Unionists did have reserves 
which stopped pursuit, and which, under any but an in- 
capable, could have converted defeat into a drawn battle, 
if not a reverse into victory. 

There is no doubt that on the 18th, more than once that 
the beam quivered in the balance until the Prussians threw 
their decisive weight into the scale, but if JSTapoleon had 
not delayed, and wasted nearly half the daylight before 
he attacked Wellington on the 18th, the Prussians, with 
all their untiring will, could not have been up to take a 
hand in the game which they did understand. 

And now. before entering upon the consideration of the 
battle of Waterloo proper, there is a very curious fact 



13 

which suggests itself. It has been ahnost invariably the 
case that the army which takes the decided oftensive, not 
a continuing, " over-from-Saturday " aggressive, but initi- 
ates a fresh battle on Sunday, almost always comes to 
grief. A veteran officer, who as a colonel was at the first 
Bull Run, 186i, and as a general was present at Appo- 
matox Court House, 1865, often declared and recorded 
that this was the experience of his four years of desperate 
fighting, during wliich time he scarcely ever missed a 
battle, and played a distinguished part throughout, viz., 
that he knew that the side which brought on a conflict on 
Sunday got the worst of it, and that the Rebels were so 
convinced of this, that with their experience of the fact, 
towards the end they were very unwilling to take the ini- 
tiative on the first day of the week. 

And now, on the ever memorable 18th June, 1815, 
amid storm and rain, the day broke on the drenched and 
bedraggled hosts confronting each other on that soaked 
field, on which, before night closed, one-sixth of those 
who fought or simply mana3uvred upon it were lying in 
their blood, dead, dying or wounded. 



WATEELOO 



In regard to the generalship displayed by Bonaparte at 
Waterloo it was in many respects stupidity itself, in spite 
of all the laudation {splendide mendax) bestowed' upon it 
by Thiers and that ilk. The marching out of the eleven 
French columns to the flourishes and music of their bands, 
with so much precision and display, was nothing more than 
a game of braggadocio or bluff". Something more real and 
grandiose, but on the same principle as that of a Chinese 
army turning somersets into line amid thunder of gongs 
and waving of dragon-flags. It was very much like M'hat 
one of our papers observed of the Panama criminals in 
court, striking attitudes, melo-dramatic, with grandilo- 
quence. It recalls what Pope Pius YII. said of Napoleon 



14 

M'heedling when lie found that menaces failed, " Trage- 
diante ! Corned lante ! It is a great pity that Welling- 
ton did not open upon the actors and knock some of the 
parade ont of the fantasia. Having failed to frighten the 
English by this grand "country circus," truly "wars 
magnificent array," "blare of bugle and clamor of men," 
Napoleon continued to add to his blunders, one after 
another. If the idea ever entered into his head that the 
Prussians could take a hand in the game, his immediate 
principal attack should have been directed to crush, en- 
velope, and destroy Wellington's left, get in his rear, and 
gain possession of the road to Brussels. It was exactly 
wdiat Lee ought to have done at Gettysburg — turned the 
Union left, captured the trains and reserve-parks in the 
left rear of the Tiound-Tops, and occupied those key-points 
of the field. Sickles stopped that. There was no need of 
a Sickles at Waterloo, because there was no attempt of the 
kind made. Any one who will examine a plan of the field, 
showing the position occupied by the troops on the left, 
can comprehend the whole situation there. Major- 
General John Mitchell depicts it in a few words: "The 
two next brigades of Light Cavalry on the Wavre road — the 
nearest under General Yandeleur, and the other under Sir 
Hussey Yivian — form tJie extreme left. Till the arrival of 
the Prussians this wing is without support ^ completely en 
V air (in air), according to the French expression, but 
owing to the open nature of the ground, easily supported, 
or even thrown back if necessary. " 

There is no more proof necessary to show the English 
extreme left was not even menaced than that when, near 
the end of the battle, nearly 7 p. m., Vivian and Yandeleur 
were brought over by Lord Uxbridge, as soon as Ziethen's 
(Prussian 1st) corps was coming up on the road from 
Ohain, to reinforce the centre. " The sight which greeted 
them there greatly surprised these horsemen, hitherto out 
of sight of the actual fighting, and the scene of ruin was 
such as to persuade them that they had been brought np 
to cover a retreat." 

Instead of Napoleon's launching a column of crushing 
weight against the English left, "in air, without support," 
and interposing decisively between Wellington and Blucher ; 
or instead of demonstrating strongly against the British 



\ 
\ 



15 

centre and less against the British right, he attacked in force 
that which was about the strongest point of Wellington's line 
— the right — and assaulted a prej)ared and strengthened 
stronghold with infantry alone, losing, first and last, in the 
course of the attempt, 5,000 men, when a previous heavy 
fire of artillery would have levelled Hngomont, and opened 
the way for his Foot. When victimized. Grouchy — made tlie 
scapegoat of his superior's blunders — endeavored to re- 
monstrate with ISTapoleon in regard to detaching him 
(Grouchy), too late, in pursuit of the Prussians, of whom 
all traces had been lost for ten hours— Na^^oleon, from the 
height of his authority and reputation, squelched the 
Marshal with the question, "If he. Grouchy, pretended to 
give him lessons? " 

Any general of practical exjDcrience might have given 
Napoleon useful lessons from 8 a. m. until 8 o'clock p. m., 
18th June, 1815. Clausewitz, the ablest, concisest and 
clearest military writer of the period, perhaps of any 
period, in his " Campaign of 1815 in France," observes 
that Waterloo was a parallel attack [like Borodino], 
a battle of shock, without manoeuvres, and finally the 
attack upon the centre a matter of immediate necessity 
rather than the result of a digested plan. 

The attack on the British right near 12 m. (llh. 35m.), 
had no other result than to absorb the attention of 
Wellington's right wing, and the BrunsMdck troops 
brought up in support (Gen. J. Shaw Kennedy, 102). 

The relative position of the Chateau Hugomont as regards 
the English right, in respect to their left, but with infinitely 
less importance, was represented by the Chateau of Friche- 
mont or Frischermont (Gardner, 192-3), " standing upon 
a wooded promontory that occupies the angle between that 
stream [the Smohain] and the Lasne, so that it was in the 
line of an advance from the direction of Wavre upon Plan- 
chenoit. Both the village and the Chateau [of Frischer- 
mont] were so far south as to be in prolongation of the 
French position, and were supposed to be held in observa- 
tion by the Cavalry on their right flank ; hnt this was so 
negligently done [Marbot to the contrary — see 'Marbot on 
the French right at Waterloo ; ' testimony entirely new] 
that Prussian patrols 'were ahle to penetrate thus far [close 
up to the French right] Mdthout molestation, and survey the 



16 

dispositions of troops [both Frencli and Englisli] in the 
vallej beyond." Remember, this Wood of Frischermont 
was also known as the Wood of Paris. On its skirts, at 10 
A. M., Major Lutzow, with a regiment of Prussian Plussars, 
replaced the English advanced posts, within cannon shot 
of the French army (Quinet, 187, 188). 

The first Act of the great Waterloo drama was the 
failure against Hugomont. (Consult Sir James Shaw 
Kennedy, § 100, p. 106.) The second commenced at 1.30 
p. M., in the attack upon La Haye-Sainte. No critic has 
attempted to defend the inexcusably vicious or faulty 
manner in which this was made. It was an assault of 
18,000 (Charras IV. Ed., 62 and 272) men in such a con- 
crete mass that the English round-shot ploughed through 
it with simply a horribly slaughterous effect. By this 
taking "the bull by the horns " upon the left-centre and 
left — the term left can scarcely be conceded as correct since 
the English Cavalry, there, were as intact as if simply 
drawn up on parade — IN^apoleon lost two-and-a-half to three 
additional hours of inestimable consequence, nearly 6,000 
men and (40?) 15 guns. (S. K., 113. C. 1,278.) Napoleon's 
admirers absolve him from all responsibility for this useless 
waste of human life. Neither honesty nor truth can find 
any excuse for him. The dimensions of the field, G-eneral 
Kennedy said— his (Wellington's) line— was only a mile long 
to the left, E., and a mile to the right, W., of the bisecting 
great Charleroi road— altogether two miles ; but its contour, 
its freedom from obstacles to sight or movement, laid it as 
open to Napoleon's gaze on the heights of Rossomme (C. 
iv., 1, 261) as if it had been a stage prepared for a spectacle. 

The interval between the English and French lines was 
not over three-quarters of a mile wide, and from the rise or 
elevation which (and the vicinity) Napoleon occupied, 
pretty much all day, the whole field was as visible with an 
ordinary field-glass as a theatre stage from a central box. 

The third Act was the charge of the 12,000 French 
Cavalry, which lasted about two hours. Napoleon' s Heavy 
Cavalry suffered such enormous loss and exhaustion that 
it was good for little or nothing during the rest of the day, 
although it had accomplished nothing. For this failure 
Napoleon casts the whole blame upon Ney and his cham- 
pions and advocates again exonerate him, the Emperor. 



17 

Note. — [This is an antitype of the exhansting in vain 
and vicious manosuvres of tlie magnificent Cavalry of 
Apollonius (I. Maccabees, X. §§ 81-2), in his battle against 
Jonathan Maccabens at Azotus, B. C. 148. "But the 
peo23le [Jewish Infantry] stood still, as Jonathan [Well- 
ington] had commanded them : and so the enemies' horse 
were tired. Then brought Simon forth his host, and set 
them against the footmen [Imperial Guard and supports], 
{for the horsemen were spent') who were discomfited by 
him, and fled." The battle of Eleasa (B. C. 160), is 
another type of Waterloo. (1 Maccabees ix. 14-18), as might 
be clearly shoMm in its course and results. Thus history 
constantly, closely and clearly repeats itself] 

Some say the first inopportune employment of this 
magnificent cavalry — for that it was magnificent no one 
can deny — was made without his authority, and that the 
second was equally unjustifiable. To the question why 
J^apoleon allowed this second waste, Mr. Ropes, who is 
claimed by a critic of experience to have said "the last word 
that can be said about Waterloo," replies, "Napoleon's 
wdiole attention was so occupied with arresting the pro- 
gress of the on-coming of the Prussians against his right 
that he could not supervise what was going on towards 
the centre." Mr. Ropes is not a Pope, actually infallible, 
and "his word" is not., and will not be, the last. 

Honest reader, is this credible % Twelve, or ten, or even 
nine thousand horsemen are not an invisible quantity, and 
from near Planchenoit (S. K,, §§ 116-121), where the fight- 
ing was going on between the French and the Prussians, 
to the rising ground, where the French Cavalry were charg- 
ing in vain upon the English squares, is an area not greater 
than the southern portion of Central Park, below the Reser- 
voir, without the majority of the obstacles to seeing every- 
thing that occurred thereon. It is just as honest a claim that 
General Warren, on the Round-Top, could not see what 
was occurring upon Cemetery Ridge, and in front of it, 
when he did, and provided against Longstreet's attack 
against the Union left. 

Again, if Napoleon had been such a pre-eminently 
clear-headed genius, and not supercilious in his self- 
estimate and depreciation of opponents, he must have 
known that he had not paralyzed Blucher at and after 



18 

Ligny ; that lie must expect him at Waterloo, as he found 
him at Mery, 19th, 20th Februarj, when boasting that he 
had annihilated him five days previous at Champaubert, 
lOtli February, 1814 ; at Montmirail, ilth ;. Vauchamps, 
14tli ; Etoges, Ilth ; and should have made preparations to 
resist him instead of detaching 33,000 to 35,000 of his best 
troops on a wild-goose chase in the wrongest direction after 
Blucher, who, on the 18th June, 1815, stole a march on 
Napoleon from Wavre to Waterloo, as he did to force the 
passage of the Elbe at Wartenburg, 3d October, 1813. Had 
he learned from experience, he M^ould have been prepared 
for the Prussian intrusion, and then could have given his 
all-sufiicient attention to what was going on in the direction 
of Wellington. 

The fact is, ISTapoleon, the Corsican Condottiere, was not 
even as great at that trade as Wallenstein, and was not 
a great tactician, as was Frederic the Great, the last of 
the truly great warrior-kings, directing and commanding 
in reality themselves. Concede that Napoleon was a 
greater strategist than Frederic, and saw more clearly the 
ohjeetive of a campaign, but, in the use of the Three Arms 
combined, he could not hold a candle to Gustavus and to 
his t\vo greatest pupils — to Marlborough, to Frederic, and 
to others, of whom the lay-world know nothing, even by 
name. 

The fourth Koi^ or fourth great attack, was entrusted to 
Ney, and was the only one made successfully. It estab- 
lished the French in the very centre of Wellington's line 
of battle. Kennedy (§ 122, 127), said: "It was at this 
stage of the action that these great qualities of the Duke 
were chiefly required and most fully displayed. We have 
already seen that La TIaye Sainte was in the hands of the 
enemy ; also the knoll on the opposite side of the road ; 
also the garden and ground on the Anglo-Allied side of it ; 
that Omp'teda's brigade was nearly annihilated, and Kiel- 
mansegge's so thinned that those two brigades could not 
hold their position. That part of the field of battle, there- 
fore, which was between lialkett's left and Kempt' s right 
w^as unprotected ; and heing the very centre of the Duhe' 8 
line of hattle^ was consequently that j^olnt^ ahove all 
others^ which the enemy wished to gain. The danger was 
imminent ; and at no other period of the action was the 



19 

result so precarious as at this moment. Most fortunately, 
Napoleon did not su2?j)ort the advantage his troops had 
gained at this point by bringing forward his reserve ; 
proving tliat he did not exert that activity and p)erso7ial 
energy^ in superintending and conforming to the progress 
of the action, which he ought to have done.'''' 

Reader, fix your attention here. You as well as any 
expert can decide upon Napoleon's want of generalship on 
this occasion. First, consider his trooj^s had carried a 
strong position, and established themselves within sixty 
yards (S. K., pp. 125-130) of the British centre, where there 
still were so few troops that an actual gap existed. All Napo- 
leon had to do was to deliver directly forward a forcible 
blow — a blow for victory. Did he see the gap ? Did he 
recognize the opportunity? Did he improve the success 
of the Ney ? on whom he afterwards threw the blame of 
the whole disaster — indeed, of the failure of the whole cam- 
paign ; the Ney he deemed so valuable, in 1812, that he 
said he would have redeemed him when he thought him 
lost in Russia, with his reserve-treasures of $75,000,000. 
No ! No ! No ! 

Instead of evincing simple common-sense and carrying 
out the forward movement, the success won at La Haye 
Sainte, Napoleon made his next attack diagonally against 
the strongest part of the British line, the right-centre, 
where Wellington had his best troops and his freshest 
reserves. 

Now, reader, pause again and consider Napoleon charged 
upon Ney the loss of the battle because he had prematurely 
M^asted his cavalry, which waste Napoleon should have 
prevented or mitigated. The fact, however, is, it was not 
Ney who wasted the cavalry, but Napoleon who suffered 
it to be wasted under his own eye. Nay ; it was neither 
Ney nor Napoleon, but the sublime^ tenacious, steadfast, 
indomitable courage of the English infantry, and the even 
more sublime courage and example of Wellington, did the 
work and did it thoroughl3\ Well might Marshal Bugeaud 
exclaim: "Oh, that English infantry ! It is luckv for the 
world there are so few of them ! " (Marbot, II., 391, 483). 

Napoleon claims, with his everlasting, arrogant assump- 
tion (Mitchell, III. 98), "Allowing one Englishman to be 
equal to one Frenchman ; a Frenchman is still equal to two 



20 

Prussians [none braver], Hanoverians, or soldiers of 
the Confederation." He traduced Wellington, belittled 
himself by depreciating the Iron Duke, who was indeed 
iron and sublime at Waterloo, and styled Blucher "a 
mere foolhardy hussar, or drunken swash-biickler," though 
Blucher was the spirit of the allied armies in 1813, again 
the impelling "Forward " force in 1814, and the real victor, 
so far as result! veness, of Waterloo, 1815. Afterwards 
IN'apoleon changed his tune, and the dire result wrung 
from his humbled pride that "the march of Blucher on 
Wav7'e [after Ligny] tvas one of those lightning flashes of 
genius which alone emanate from great generals.'''' The 
genius of the drunken "swashbuckler," was greater in this 
ease than the genius of the great war-god of the French. 

"Lies please the masses rather than truths," exclaimed 
Lanfrey (HI. 116), although he was only repeating what 
Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezeldel had declared twenty-five to 
twenty-six centuries before, and such lies are the utterances 
to which the masses are best pleased to listen. ISTapoleon 
has been so often declared to be so great a man that any 
falsehood of his own and of his panegyrists, like menda- 
cious Thiers, in his favor, is acceptable and accepted. 

Concede that Napoleon in the Waterloo campaign was 
an invalid, ]>hysically unfit for the part he undertook to 
play, and that pity for emasculated greatness should condone 
many failings. But Mr. Ropes and his ilk will not have 
this. In spite of them, however ; that he was a partially 
disabled man must be unquestionably true. His habit of 
body, his recent change of life, his fat, must have deducted 
much from the exaggerated quantity of a full Napoleon. 
Sickness or pain does not always detract from wdll-23ower 
or strength of thought ; but it does weaken every charac- 
teristic dependent in a greater or less degree on physical 
vigor. Candid physicians will inform any one that either 
of the three or four diseases under Mdiicli Napoleon labored 
render horseback exercise absolute torture, and occasion 
pain often in supportable for walking exertion or even remain- 
ing upright on the feet. A man is not fit for vigorous 
thought who is sitting a-straddle on red-hot coals sprinkled 
with corrosive acid. Lavalette gives us to understand that 
the disease of wdiich Napoleon died, cancer of the stomach, 
was already gnawing at his vitals. 



m 



21 

The day was drawing nearly to a close, and between 7 
and 7.30 p. m. the curtain drawing np upon \\iQ;'fifth and con- 
cluding Act of this stupendous drama, developing more 
and more startling situations, up to the final unsurpassably 
tragic conclusion. "La Garde au feu ! " — The Guard into 
action! — was considered a decisive stroke — "the blow, 
the Fiat of Fate." For Napoleon to order it so, and 
directed as it was, if he was in his right mind, was inex- 
cusable cruelty. French writers have described the last 
charge of the Old Guard with such flourishes of trumpets, 
such feminine bathos, such poetical rhapsody, such ti'an- 
scendental fervor, they have carried away sensible people, 
and led them to imagine that the Guard had a chance. 
It was launching — N. W. instead of IST. — an inadequate 
shot obliquely against the strongest plate and backing of 
a nickel-steel target. This column was ISTapoleon's last 
reserve, and Wellington could bring stronger reserves to 
meet it, with still other reserves behind. And here a 
remark seems necessary to clear away an error into which 
every one had fallen. The Old Guard perished in Russia ; 
not enough to form a single regiment escaped. The Im- 
perial Guard was reorganized in 1813, and in that year 
and in 1814 it suffered to such a degree — as was natural, 
when it was called upon to do so much, because it alone 
stood the strain — that even if Napoleon had continued to 
reign, it would have been simply a skeleton reclothed with 
new flesh. Disbanded by Louis XYIIL, it was 'hurriedly 
recruited after Napoleon returned from Elba. There were 
primary elements in the Guard ; as a whole it was a new 
thing. Marmont, blame him as Napoleon will, a competent 
judge, says the Guard of 1813 did not behave well on a ]3re- 
v^ious occasion, and again in 1815 at Waterloo. 

There is no doubt that the Guard was composed of 
23icked soldiers ; St. Cyr complained that Napoleon injured 
the army by collecting the best and bravest into one body ; 
but that the Guard which appeared at Ligny and at Water- 
loo was composed of the old soldiers of the Revolution 
and campaigns immediately succeeding is almost ridiculous, 
simply because impossible. In twenty-five years of such con- 
stant fighting and labors, such marches and exposure, the 
"Military Arithmetic' ' of the greatest consumer of life M^ould 
prove by figures that the original stratum of the original 



22 

Consular and Imperial Guard existed in 1815 no more 
than the dislocated remains from which a scientist, hy 
addition, reconstructs a lost species. (C. IV., I., 65). 

Even if the last attack had been thrust forward — direc- 
tion, IST. — from La Haye Sainte, and \\2>.(i2:> erf orated the 
British lines, what effective result could have followed with 
50,000 Prussians bursting in on flank and rear, and 
Grouchy with his 33,000 sufiiciently occu]^ied byThielman 
at Wavre, seven to nine hours' march, at shortest, dis- 
tant, and at least 20,000 other disposable Prussians firmly 
in the way. There was never a moment that tlie Guard 
had the faintest chance of success. It was stopped, slaugh- 
tered, crushed as stone in a breaker ; then dissolved, and 
with it the whole French army. In fact, the greater 
part of the army was already in a state of dissolution. As 
a simile, it was like a large cake of ice, still holding to- 
gether when all the surrounding ice was disintegrating, 
resolving itself imperceptibly into its original fluid. A 
moment, and the cake is still apparently intact ; then, like 
the rest, it is gone. The French have a word which Zola 
applies to the utter overthrow of France in 1870-71 — 
DebxVcle ! No English word furnishes a sufiiciently por- 
tentous definition. That word ex^^resses everything that 
occurred. Charras is equally forcible, but employs a sen- 
tence for what Zola requires but one word. Charras says, 
"It was the horrors of Wilna [1812, after the Pussian 
Cataclysm] at the gates of France." And, again summing 
up, Charras (IV. 1, 323, Text and jSTote 3) admits that the 
French losses in killed, wounded and prisoners (Text, 
23,600 t 7,000 t S or 9,000) was 39,000 or (Note) 
37,000 ; that nothing was wanting to the disaster. Thirty 
thousand is far below the reality ; between casualties on 
the field, the pursuit, desertion and malingering, the army 
went to water as an organization. To magnify the catastro- 
phe, Napole6n had prepared no reserve. Berthezene (II., 
323), his enthusiastic admirer, says he made no attempt 
to rally his troops. 

The remains of the division of Girard, to all intents and 
purposes left behind and forgotten near Ligny, might have 
saved, protected something. It disappeared or was swept 
away by the dehaGle. Whether its list of casualties did 
or did "not exceed 32,000, 35,000 or 39,000, the Grand 



tofC, 



23 

Army was a thing of the past, as was the Grand Army of 
another vain-glorious general, Gates, after Camden, S. C., 
in 1780. 

As was recorded of the memorable Armada, beaten by 
the English and Dutch, so it was with Napoleon's Grand 
Army, annihilated by the Anglo-Allies and Prussians. 

" Afflavit Deus et dissipati sunt." "God breathed in 
anger and "they vanished away;" or, "God the Almighty 
blew, and the Armada went to every wind." 

The Prussians revelled in a Carnival of just and justified 
retribution, for the greater, cold - blooded, commanded 
brutality and calculated savagery of the French at Ligny 
and throughout the campaign, and in previous years, de- 
served no less. The unmanly treatment of their queen and 
despoliation of their country could scarcely have been ex- 
]3iated by the killing of the last Frenchman of this Grand 
Army, and it is a pity Blucher did not catch Napoleon. 

Captain Alexander Gordon, in his '-'-Prussiad^''^ 1759, in 
honor of Frederic the Great, King of Prussia, uses lan- 
guage which might justly be applied to Blucher' s Prussians 
in their pursuit of the French after Waterloo : 

" Upon the precipice of danger, see 
[Blucher] in person, while his blazing sword 
Hangs on the verge of death, and rules the light. 
Beneath him, in the dark abyss, appear 
Carnage, besmeared with gore, and red-faced Rout ; 
Pursuit upon the back of -panting Flight, 
Hacks terrible, and gashes him [the French] with 
wounds." 

Napoleon, in his utter selfishness, was still wickedly un- 
just to the victims of their fidelity to him until he dictated 
what has been styled the "bombast" — some use much 
harsher terms — "of St. Helena." 

It has even been said that — in contrast to his vain vaunt 
before the battle, when he boasted, "At last I have those 
English, with ninety chances out of a hundred in my 
favor" — he uttered the cruel remark, "That it had always 
been so with the French since Crecy (1346) [i. e.^ to be 
defeated by the English], and he might have expected it." 
If he did say so, it is very likely that such a conviction 
induced him to relinquish the pursuit of Sir John Moore, 



24 

1809, after he witnessed the overtlirow of a portion of the 
cavah-j of his Guard at Benavente, although lie had boasted 
that "he was going to measure himself with Moore, the 
only general worthy of his encounter," and. left the defeat 
for Soult, claiming that the menace of Austria recalled him 
to Paris, although he lingered in Spain, at Valladolid, 
longer than it took Soult to follow up the retiring English 
to Corunna, simply to be defeated, and witness the fall of 
Moore there, in the arms of Victory. 



MAEBOT O^ THE EIGHT AT WATEELOO. 

In 1830, Colonel [Brigadier-General] de Marbot wrote 
to General [Marshal] E. de Grouchy. (It is curious that 
no mention has ever been made of Marbot and his recon- 
noissances toM^ard Wavre until his book came out in 1891. 
If I^apoleon sent orderly ofiicers to Grouchy, why did they 
not pass through Marbot' s posts, if the Emperor was actu- 
ally expecting Grouchy, instead of being sent by round- 
about routes to escape the Prussians. There are strange 
incompatibilities in Marbot' s story to which Eopes, 
perhaps wisely for his argument, makes no allusion.) : 

"The Seventh Hussars, of which I was Colonel, be- 
longed to the First Light Cavalry division, attached to 
the First Corps, 18th June, 1818, the right of that portion 
of the army commanded in person by the Emperor. When 
the action began, towards 11 a. m. [Gardner, 11.30 a, m. 
222], I was detached from the division with my regiment, 
[three guns] and a battalion of [light] infantry placed under 
my command. These troops were posted en potence, 
on the extreme right, ' ' ^^Marhot does not seem to think much 
of his superiors'^ tactics. "They made us manceuvre 
LIKE PUMPKINS." Docs lic mean that they rolled them 
about objectless or at random, as boys roll pumpkins 
aa:ainst each other to see them rebound or burst ! ] hehind 
Frichemont^ facing the Dyle. Through his aid-de-camp, 
Labedoyere, and an [orderly] officier d'' ordonnance.^ whose 
name I do not recall, detailed instructions were given me 
as from the Emperor. 



25 

"These orders prescribed leaving the majority of my 
troops always in sight of the battlefield, to post 200 Foot 
in the wood oi Frichemont [Bois de Paris], a squadron at 
Lasne [on the Lasne], pushing the posts out to St. Lam- 
bert ; another squadron half to Couture, half to Beau- 
mont ; sending out reconnoissances as far as the Dyle, to 
the Bridges of Moustier and of Ottignies. [Where was 
Grouchy at this time ? At Walhain (Gardner, 160) about 
noon or a little later. "Walhain is about as far (to the 
S, E.) from the two bridges, as Wavre was to the N. E. of 
them. Iso direct road connected these points, only across- 
country roads. See Charras (IV., 363, 387 and 653) ; one 
bridge, Moustier [Mousty], wood, 40 inches wide ; the 
other of stone, so narrow, 120 inches, that only one carriage 
could pass at a time. [See Gardner, pp. 119, 167. ] The com- 
manders of these difterent detachments were to leave, 
every quarter league, small cavalry posts, forming a 
continual chain even to the field of battle, so that, by 
means of Hussars galloping from one post to another, the 
ofiicers reconnoitering could notify me promptly of their 
junction with the advance-guards of Marshal Grouchy 's 
troops, who should (were to) come up from the direction 
of the Dyle. I was ordered to dispatch directly to the 
Emperor the facts transmitted to me by these reconnois- 
sances. I saw to the execution of the orders given to me. 
After a lapse of fifteen years I find it impossible to state 
the exact hour at which the detacliment directed on Mous- 
tier reached that point, the more so since Captain Eloy, its 
commander, had my injunctions to scout far and wide, and 
to march with the greatest circumspection. But, remark- 
ing that he started from the battlefield at 11 a. m., and 
had only to cover two leagues, the presumption is he did 
so in two hours, which will fix his reaching Moustier at 
1.30 p. M. Through a note from Captain Eloy, brought 
to me promptly through the intermediate posts, I learned 
that he had found no enemy at Moustier [Mousty] nor 
at Ottignies, and the inhabitants assured him that the 
French left on the right [E.] shore of the Dyle were pass- 
ing the river at Limal, Limelette and Wavre. I sent this 
note to the Emperor by Captain Kouhn, doing duty as 
Adjutant-Major. He returned, accompanied by an orderly 
officer {(P Ordonnance), who directed me, as from the Em- 



26 

pei'or, to leave the line of posts estalDlislied towards 
Moustier, and to order the officer who was examining tlie 
defile of St. Lambert to pass beyond it, ])nshing on as far 
as possible in the direction of Limal, Limelette and Wavre. 
I transmitted this order, and even sent my map to the 
officer commanding detachment at Lasne and at St. Lam- 
bert. 

" One of my platoons having advanced a (piarter league 
beyond St. Lambert, encountered a platoon of Prussian 
hussars, several of whom they took, one an officer. I no- 
tified the Emperor of this strange capture, and sent the 
prisoners to him." 

[The reader's attention is especially directed to the date 
of this letter, 1830, fifteen years after the battle. The 
writer has known the most remarkable instances of vital 
discrepancies between the statements of officers five years, 
and even much less, after events, and their diaries ; lapses 
of memory wliich seemed incredible. Marbot speaks as if 
he was watching like a cat every crack and corner of the 
district entrusted to his supervision, whereas Gardner 
states (192, 115-6) that "the Prussian patrols were able to 
penetrate thus far [L e, to Frischermont) without molesta- 
tion, and survey the dispositions of troops [French] in the 
valley beyond." Marbot's story and the relations of the 
English and Prussians do not agree at all, and his letter is 
not borne out by facts known to^ have transpired, or else 
the Waterloo story is a myth in whole and in detail. Quinet, 
(187-8) admits Prussian Cavalry replaced (10 a.m.) the Eng- 
lish outposts on the left and remained in observation within 
cannon shot of the French Army. AYliere, then, were 
Marbot's light infantry and guns, left at this very point?] 
"Informed by these [prisoners] that they were followed by 
a great part of the Prussian army, I hastened with a scpiacl- 
ron to my detachment at St. Lambert, beyond which I per- 
ceived a strong column moving on St. Lambert. I despatched 
an officer as fast as possible to notify the Emperor, who, in 
response, ordered me to advance boldly ; that this column 
could be none other than Marshal Grouchy' s corps coming 
from Limal, and driving before him some scattered Prus- 
sians to whom the prisoners which I had made belonged. 
I soon found that the contrary was the fact. The head 
of the Prussian column approached, although very 



27 

slowly. Twice I drove back into tlie defile the hussars 
and lancers who preceded it. I sought to gain time in 
holding back the enemy as long as possible, since they 
could only with great ditficnlty debouch from the deep and 
miry country roads throngli which they w^ere struggling, 
and when, at length, compelled by superior force, I had to 
retreat, the Adjutant-Major, whom I had ordered to go 
and inform the Emperor of the positive arrival of the 
Prussians in front of St. Lambert, returned to me, saying 
that the Emperor directed me to notify this fact to 'the 
head of Marshal Grouchy's column, who should be de- 
bouching at this moment by the bridges of Moustier and 
Ottignies, since it w^as not coming by those of Limal and 
J^imelette. I wrote to this effect to Captain Eloy, but 
he, having waited in vain without seeing any troops appear, 
and hearing the cannon towards St. Lambert, fearing to be 
cut off, he fell back, therefore, successively on his little 
posts, and rejoined the main body of the regiment, resting 
in view of the battlefield^ about the same moment as 
the squadrons retiring from St. Lambert and Lasne, 
driven in by the enemy. The terrible combat which the 
troops I commanded, and those which came up in suj)port 
of them, sustained behind the wood Frichemont, occupied 
my mind too much for me to be able to exactly specify 
the hour, but I think it must have been nearly 7 p. m., 
and as Captain Eloy retired at a trot, and could not have 
been over an hour in returning, I estimate it was towards 
6 p. M. when he cpiit the bridge of Moustier, where conse- 
quently he remained five hours. It is, therefore, very 
surprising that he did not see your [Grouchy's] aide-de- 
camp, unless this aide mistook the name of the place wdien 
he struck the Dyle. 

"Such is the statement of the movements made by the 
regiment I commanded to scout [towards Grouchy's corps] 
[out from] the right flank of the French array during the 
battle of Waterloo. The march, the directions of my 
reconnoissance, were of so momentous importance on this 
memorable day that Marshal Davout, Minister of War, 
at the close of 1815, ordered me to state the circumstances 
which I had the honor to address to him, and which 
ought to be found [but which can not be discovered] among 
the War Archives. 



28 

"From the facts whicli I have set forth, I am convinced 
that the Emperor expected Grouchy' s corps on the battle- 
field of Waterloo. But what foundation was there for this 
hope ? Of that I am ignorant, and I will not permit my- 
self to judge, restricting my narrative to what I saw." 

Again I call the reader's attention to several points. 

First. — Napoleon was informed that no French troops 
had passed the Dyle at 1 p. m. ; one and one-half hours 
after some strange troops had manifested themselves on the 
Heights of St. Lambert, l)ecause their appearance gave 
rise to a discussion between himself and Soult. According to 
Gardner (155-91), this must have been before noon or short- 
ly after, and same time (Gardner, 191), 1 p.m.. Napoleon 
sent cavalry to menaced quarter. 

Second. — Marbot emj^hasizes the difficulty attending the 
march of the Prussians on the across-country roads leading 
to St. Lambert, and that he twice repulsed [could this be 
so ?] their cavalry into the defile from which they were en- 
deavoring to extricate themselves. Prussian Hussars, to- 
wards 10 A.M., were already observing the French right 
in the Wood of Frischermont, or Paris (Quinet, XL, 187). 

Third. — That if it was near 6 or 7 p. m. before it was 
certain that the Prussians were coming, and that Grouchy 
was not coming, there was still j)lenty of time for Napoleon 
to make some effort to efi'ect an orderly retreat, because it 
was not until after 7 o'clock that he sent forward his 
Guard to useless slaughter, a body of veterans around 
which might have been gathered sufficient old troops to 
save the honor of the army, preserve a great deal of the 
material, and, if Girard's division had been found in posi- 
tion at Quatre Bras, to have left the memory of Waterloo 
indeed as a deplorable defeat, but not what the French 
style a debacle., which means an utter dissolution, like the 
breaking up of an ice-gorge, utter ruin, and utterly ruin- 
ous, like the bursting of the Croton Dam in 1841, or the 
Housatonic in 18 — , or the freshet of the Poeliff Jansen 
in 1879, or the giving M^ay of the Johnstown dam, May 
31st, 1890. 

Final word : To say that Wellington won the battle of 
Waterloo is a perversion of terms. It is the truth — and 
that is glory enough for him aiid his troops — that they 



29 

held their own and so long against such terrible odds. 
Blucher decided, and therefore technically as well as vir- 
tually won the battle and gleaned as well as gathered the 
fruits. An English woman, Harriet Martinean, in her 
"History of England," with the nice perception of her 
sex, remarks: " l%e suocess of the hattle, hoioever, vkis 
MAINLY secured hy the arrival of the Prussians.''^ Where 
would Wellington have been if one- quarter of Napoleon's 
best troops had not been diverted from Wellington to meet 
and to hold off the Prussians while Napoleon was making 
his desperate throws for probabilities ? Anchor. 




30 

Note to Marbot's Letter. — In the enumeration and de- 
tails of Napoleon's Grand Army, page 167, &c., Grollman, 
XIY. Tlnel, Band I, : There are no 7th Hussars in Jacqui- 
not's Cavalry Division, d'Erlons First Corps, but there is a 
regiment, 7th Chasseurs. "Ofiiciers d'Ordonnance" M^ere 
equivalent to Aides-de-camp to the Commander-in-Chief, 
in the English service (Mitchell's F. of N., L, 316). 



SIE JOHE" MOOEE vs. l^TAPOLEON. 

The first paragraph on page 24 refers to the questionable 
conduct in regard to Napoleon's suddenly relinquishing the 
23ursuit of Moore, after crossing the Sierra Guadarama in a 
blizzard, which, according to Gen. Mathieu Dumas, "ren- 
dered the passage more difficult and attended with a greater 
loss of men than that over the St. Bernard, or [that over] 
the;,Splugen in 1800" (Schlosser, Yol. YIII,, 52*). Why, 
after such a display of energy. Napoleon did not continue 
to follow Moore to the bitter end, is a question which can 
only be solved by circumstantial, not positive, evidence. 
Gen. Marbot, to whom Napoleon left a large legacy for his 
championshij), seems unable to explain why Napoleon did 
not personally finish the war in Spain, and hunt the English 
out of the Peninsula, especially when his hands were free 
elsewhere (IL, 480) after his marriage with the Austrian. 
Lanfrey was credited with the first announcement (see 
Ed. YL, Yol. lY., 456-463) that Napoleon's excuses for quit- 
ting his army at Astorga on account of news of the hostile 
movements of Austria, were not the true cause. A variety 
of explanations had been proposed, but they appeared in 
works with a small circulation, and thus none attracted 
notice until Lanfrey obtained the ear and eye of the world 
and boldly enunciated the opinion that Napoleon did not 
like to risk tlie loss of his reputation by coming into actual 
contact with the English general, whose ability he admitted, 
and whose troops, he was to learn, more and more, year by 
year, were the most dangerous antagonists to tackle, even 
with the experience of French generals and the war-making 
power of their veteran troops. Lt.-Col., afterwards Maj.- 
Gen. John Mitchell, British Army, had antedated Lanfrey 



31 

in this opinion about 23 to 25 years since, in his '•''Fall of 
Najpoleon'''' (Ed. II,, YoL I., 127-129), and even Murrcnf 8 
Hand-Booh for Spain put the matter plainly in print in 
1845, pp. 590, &c., especially 591, Benavente ; 650, Lvgo ; 
65-4, La Coruna. The fact is ISTapoleon absolutely flunked, 
and his plea of the necessity for an iunnediate return to 
France is on a par with most of his assertions. He aban- 
doned the pursuit at Astorga lst-2d January, 1809, but did 
not leave Valladolid, on his way out of Spain, until 7 a.m. 
17th (see Charles Dolly's '•'- Itineraire cle Napoleon^'^'' Paris, 
1842). Meanwhile, Moore had given Napoleon's Guard a 
slap in the face at Benavente, 29th December, 1808; had 
repulsed Lallemand at Lugo, 6th January, 1809 ; had 
halted and offered battle to Soult 6th and 8th January, and 
was victorious over Soult, before Coruna, 16th January, the 
day before N^apoleon, rushing away, in such a tremendous 
hurry, as he had claimed, left Valladolid. The writer wishes 
he had time and space to furnish maps and the comj^ara- 
tive evidence gathered, but it will keep. Suflicient to add 
covert allusions to the giving over of the pursuit of Moore 
is to be found in Guizot, Thiers and others, and Croker 
notes (1826) in his Correspondence and Diaries (I., 327-8) — 
nineteen years before Gen. Mitchell wrote — "An Enigma 
in Buonaparte's Career," a paragraph in which Wellington 
is of opinion ISTapoleon M^as not so sure of victory as to assume 
the risk de sef rotter (rubbing hard) against Moore. 

These few pages are no more than a rough sketch, or 
draught, of an intended work in extenso — what a Stamm- 
corps or Cadre is to a Regiment; a skeleton, to be clothed 
with flesh — recruits, to be moulded or disciplined into a 
regular organization with full ranks, handsomely uniformed 
and correspondingly armed and equipped. 

It may shock the prejudices of people generally to say 
that Napoleon did not possess an original mind, and was 
very much of a Cagliostro, a charlatan ; nevertheless, it is 
so. All the grand conceptions attributed to him were what 
was said of the Prussian operations, in 1866, against Aus- 
tria, but even more so of those in 1870-1, against France — 
IMPROVISATIONS — Studied, worked out with labored care and 
prepared by the application of studies continued through 
many years. For instance, his fii*st great campaign in Italy 



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was simply an application of tlie plans of Las Minas and 
Maillebois, who operated on that same ground in 1745, and 
whose text, maps and plans ^Napoleon had with him, and had 
studied out as a student prepares his theses. To apply his 
knowledge, he had "the magic sword of the revolution, 
which would cut in the hands of anyone — would cut of itself ' ' 
Gallenga, thehistorian of Piedmont, disclosed (1854) the dem- 
onstration by Buonaparte of Maillebois' problems, as setforth 
in the latter' s elaborate maps and plans. Recently the Ger- 
mans have revived this consideration, and Captain von 
Bremen's article, translated into English, appeared in the 
Journal of the U. S. Military Service Institution^ for Sep- 
tember, 1892. It can be shown that all the great ideas 
claimed by the Chauvanistic panegyrists of IN^apoleon as 
original with him, were revamped prospects, already begot- 
ten before he was born ; projects upon which he might have 
come through the multifarious reading of his subaltern years, 
of which he boasted to the Emperors and Kings, when, with 
an upstart' s arrogance, he was lording it over them like a sud- 
denly wealthy parvenu among representatives of respectable 
old families or firms. 

Finally Sal v and y, a writer apparently of Bonapartist pro- 
clivities, in the Dictionnaire de la Conversation, LIIL, 
655, observes [Elba, Waterloo, St. Helena] : "This finish, 
or outcome, of the Drama of the Empire comj)letely attests 
theessentialfragility of JNTapoleon's power. * - JN'othing 
proves more clearly that the pyramid of brass was based 
upon sand. * * That which perished in his hands did 
not perish solely through his deed, but also through the deed 
[or action] of his destiny. That [again] is composed of 
problems to all appearances insoluble. But this may be said 
with certainty: He [Napoleon] fell because he ignored 
justice. JSfo one will dare to add that he maintained him- 
self with justice. ' ' This injustice manifested itself wherever 
an opportunity ofliered, but culminated in such cowardly 
calumnies as those against Yandaume, a most brutal but 
most able commander, in 1813 ; against Augerau, who 
saved French honor at Castiglione, in 1796, and Marmont, 
who served his master only too faithfully, in 1814 ; but last, 
and especiall}^, Ney and Grouchy in the Waterloo cam- 
paign. ISTapoleon could not be truthful, could not be honest, 
could not be just. (Maemont, 9, 415, corroborates.) 



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